you are saying that receiving the endorsement of SIDA should have been expected.

Therefore you must have caught the SIDA debate between Mr. Harrison and Mr. Recchia. It was a clear victory for Mr. Harrison and sealed his endorsement by the Club.

Our January meeting was well attended by both Club members and supporters of Domenic Recchia.

Club President, Nick Popolo did the coin flip which Steve Harrison won and elected to go first. Both candidates were permitted to make opening and closing statememts. The Club was very familiar with Steve Harrison but this was the first time Club members had an opportunity to hear Councilman Recchia speak and ask him questions. Councilman Recchia only started to appear at Democrat events on Staten Island in the Fall of 2007.

Since Councilman Recchia's position on the issues were unknown, most of the questions were directed at him  but Steve Harrison was allowed to give his position on the issue raised in the question.

I had asked Councilman Recchia to respond to a posting in the Daily Gothan were he said that we should get out of Iraq when the Iraqis are ready to stand up and that he would support permanent bases in Iraq. When I pointed out that these were the positions of George Bush and John McCain and not the positions of the Democratic candidates, he did not back away from the ready to stand up comment and defended the permanent bases comment.

As the vote at our February meeting indicates, Club members felt that Steve Harrison was by far the best candidate. Speaking to Club members the consensus was that Steve Harrison was more in line with the positions of the Democratic Party, had better command of the issues and was better able to articulate his position on the issues.